Prominent locals to buy Santa Rosa paper

SANTA ROSA

Published 9:20 pm, Sunday, November 4, 2012

Former Chronicle Publisher Steven Falk is part of the new ownership group.

Former Chronicle Publisher Steven Falk is part of the new ownership group.

Photo: Lea Suzuki, SFC

Prominent locals to buy Santa Rosa paper

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A politically connected group of local owners is set to take over the Santa Rosa Press Democrat, closing the deal as soon as this week.

The group, which includes Democratic lobbyist and developer Darius Anderson and former North Bay Rep. Doug Bosco, will buy the Press Democrat, the weekly Petaluma Argus-Courier and Santa Rosa's North Bay Business Journal from the Halifax Media Group for an undisclosed price.

There are plenty of links among the four main investors. Anderson, 48, was an intern in Bosco's congressional office in the 1980s and is on the board of directors of the San Francisco chamber, which is led by Falk. The fourth investor, 54-year-old Bill Hooper, is president of Kenwood Investments, which was founded and led by Anderson.

"I've worked with Darius and Doug Bosco, and they love the community and respect the newspaper," Falk said. "They hated the thought that an outside owner would get involved and not do right by the paper."

The new owners might have more local ties than some Sonoma County residents would prefer, however.

As owner and founder of the Sacramento-based Platinum Advisors lobbying firm, Anderson represents clients ranging from public agencies like the Golden Gate Bridge district, Napa County, and the cities of Berkeley and Martinez to corporate groups like Sutter Health, Clear Channel Communications and Tesla Motors.

Big political players

One of his clients is Las Vegas' Station Casinos, the deep-pocketed partner in the controversial Indian hotel-casino under construction on 64 acres in Rohnert Park. Neighbors and others in the county fought unsuccessfully for nearly a decade to block the gambling hall, which is expected to open late next year with 3,000 slot machines.

Anderson's plan to build a 59-room luxury hotel in the heart of downtown Sonoma also has drawn complaints from residents worried it will change the feeling of the town.

Anderson is no stranger to controversy. A friend and fundraiser for leading Democrats like former San Francisco mayors Willie Brown and Gavin Newsom, former Gov. Gray Davis, and many others, he has been accused of using those political connections to help build his various businesses. Kenwood Investments, for example, is one of the developers of San Francisco's $1.5 billion Treasure Island project, and his company is a lobbyist for the proposed waterfront arena for the Golden State Warriors.

Likewise, Bosco has made both friends and enemies during his years as a political force in the North Bay. The 66-year-old Bosco spent four years in the state Assembly and eight years in Congress before narrowly losing his seat to Republican Frank Riggs in 1990. While working as an attorney representing some of the state's largest landowners and insurance companies, he has continued to stay involved in government, currently serving as chairman of the California State Coastal Conservancy.

Since the sale of the Press Democrat was announced last week, local websites and blogs have been buzzing with questions of whether Anderson and Bosco's local interests and battles will influence the paper's news coverage.

'Sense of community'

That's not going to happen, Falk said.

"Clearly the ownership of this paper is not going to meddle in the journalism of this newspaper," he said. "Credibility is all any newspaper has, and we're not going to lose that.

"It's an interesting group of people who are involved here, but they're involved because of a strong sense of community, not for some other agenda."

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Discussions leading to the sale have been going on for months, Falk said, probably starting not long after the Florida-based Halifax bought the Sonoma County papers from the New York Times in January as part of a larger, $143 million deal that included 13 other papers, mostly in the Southeast.

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